In an article entitled “Man accused in $78 million pump-and-dump scheme files B.C. court petition,” the Vancouver Sun shares developments in recent court filings made by British businessman, Kevin Miller against the Law Society of British Columbia. A 2015 US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) complaint implicated Miller and others in artificially inflating stock prices and concealing illicit profits of a company called Jammin’ Java. Two years later, the SEC announced it had obtained a US $58 million judgment in the case, causing Miller to pay nearly US $1 million in a settlement. Miller entered into the settlement agreement without admitting or denying the SEC’s allegations.

More recently, Miller has petitioned the BC Supreme Court, claiming he is entitled to nearly $3.5 million held in the trust accounts of the law practice of Ronald Norman Pelletier, which the Law Society currently has custodianship over. Pelletier is accused of using or permitting the use of his firm’s trust accounts to receive or disburse about CAD $24 million and US $5 million on behalf of one or more clients when he knew there was an investigation into securities fraud by the SEC. 

In April 2018, the Law Society obtained an order prohibiting Pelletier from operating a trust account until a disciplinary panel conducted a hearing into his alleged professional misconduct. The Law Society’s citation states that Pelletier engaged in activities that assisted or encouraged dishonesty, crime or fraud. A hearing was held earlier this year but a decision is still pending. Pelletier stopped practising law in 2018.

In his court filings, Miller argues that he is entitled to the return of money he claims he paid into Pelletier’s trust accounts for legal services, particularly given he reached a settlement with the SEC. “The SEC complaint against Mr. Miller has been entirely resolved,” says the petition. “There is no juristic reason for the (Law Society) to continue to withhold Mr. Miller’s trust funds.”

BIV – Business Intelligence For British Columbia published Graeme Wood’s article entitled “Will B.C. adopt ‘McMafia’ law to combat money laundering?” on August 11, 2022. In his article, Wood compares the potential advantages and risks of Unexplained Wealth Orders (UWOs) in response to a growing number of large mansions on Richmond farmlands with alleged ties to criminal financial activities. UWOs would allow law enforcement to compel property owners to disclose the source of their wealth in certain circumstances that meet the evidentiary threshold, where criminal activity is suspected. As such, UWOs are an anti-money laundering tool that operate under the controversial reverse onus principle by putting the onus of innocence on the homeowner.

As Richmond farmlands balloon in value to upwards of 20 million dollars, local community groups such as Richmond FarmWatch urged Commissioner Austin Cullen in 2019’s Public Inquiry into Money Laundering (entitled the Cullen Commission) to consider UWOs as a tool for law enforcement to deter illicit financial dealings. While there is no concrete evidence of money laundering, farming advocates refer to media reports of residences used as illegal hotels and casinos with connections to organized crime, as well as foreign buyers’ tax exemption on Canadian farmlands, as justification for the use of UWOs. In his final report, Cullen accepted UWOs as a “valuable tool” in deterring the “accumulation of illicit wealth by those engaged in profit-oriented criminal activities.” 

Despite this, Commission observers like criminal defence attorney, Joven Narwal argue that the adoption of UWOs would result in “increase(d) state surveillance and an erosion of privacy protections for all British Columbians.” Narwal contends that how government entities will use information gathered by UWOs is yet to be determined. This information could be shared across institutions that decide independently (and at times arbitrarily) that it’s indicative of illicit activity, sparking costly inquiries, audits and investigations of innocent people. Similarly, the BC Civil Liberties Association object to the use of UWOs, arguing that they “undermine privacy rights, the presumption of innocence and the right to silence. They have only been adopted in a few countries, and there is no credible evidence that they have been effective.” 

BC’s Civil Forfeiture Act, to which UWOs would likely fall under, is presently being challenged at the B.C. Court of Appeal.